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What to do with your inactive EPF account

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After changing job from one employer to other, employees are required to initiate their EPF balance transfer to new account. Due to some reason these people do not initiate or initiation may be stopped in between for some reason without transferring the balance in employee provident fund account.

If your EPF account is inactive for 36 months then such account will not be getting any interest that you are supposed to get for your investments.

An EPF account can be inactive if your employer or you do not have deposited contributions. In case of winding up of the company, employees provident fund account also kept inactive as it’s not in operation by the company. There can be some other reason for which your EPF account can be kept inactive.

In this article we have listed few steps which can be helpful for your in case your employee provident fund account is not active for a long time.

Action to be taken for inactive EPF account

  • If presently you are in job then ask your employer to initiate transfer of old inactive EPF account balance to the present Employee Provident Fund account. By doing this you can get your balance to new account. Form 13 will be required to be submitted for such transfer.
  • If you are not into a job and are unemployed for 2 months then apply for withdrawal through your previous employer. Form 19 is required to fill up for withdrawal.

After transferring your inactive EPF account balance to the active one, you will continue getting interest for the accumulated amount at the present rate of 8.5 % per annum.

What to do with your inactive EPF account - Transfer EPF BalanceChecklist to avoid such circumstances

While leaving your company you have to make sure that following things are collected;

  • EPF account number and EPFO office address where your company maintain your account.
  • Your company address to which EPF transfer or withdrawal form need to be sent. This will be required as your next employer will be sending the transfer form to your previous employer for approval.
  • If possible get phone numbers and email ID of the concern person with whom you can get in touch after leaving your organization.

If you have not initiated such return then talk to your present employer right now. Good Luck!